Wires
by JACmRob
Summary: Marti may have been young, but she wasn’t stupid. Suspenseful, some Dasey, EVERYONE angst. R
1. Chapter 1

**Wires**

By JACmRob

Disclaimer: I don't own LwD. The idea, though, is my own.

* * *

"It's JST up two to one against BS Tollgate, let's hear it folks for our home team! Number 12, Collins, takes the puck, and he's quickly flagged by their defense—oooh—bad move Sparrow Thompson…"

George scanned the rink for his son, spotting him flit above the offensive line and—

"39, Venturi, steals it back!"

George threw a fist in the air while the spectators erupted into applause. Besides him, Marti was jumping up and down with a red JST flag in her hand, blue-lipped and cheering wildly. On his other side Edwin was shivering and Nora distractedly running a hand through her hair, eyes on the rink. She was being taught how to use her new digital camera by a frustrated Lizzie who was taking orders from Casey. They all turned at the sound of Derek's name and applauded, forgetting the camera for a minute until Casey began lecturing in a no-nonsense tone on how to use the video-playback.

"Venturi's heading up the left shoulder, passes to Number 9, Delfino who sends it back and he's lining up the shot—he aims—he shoots—"

A groan rose from the audience. George sighed. On his left, Nora shoved the camera back to Lizzie and began yelling furiously at the match below while Marti shrieked "No fair!" over and over.

"A nice save by Tollgate goalie Dan Martin, bad luck there folks…"

Damn, he thought. It was their final play-off game. If they won, they would proceed to the championships. If they lost, well, the Venturi-MacDonald residence would face severe and utter destruction. Derek didn't take hockey lightly.

The timer was running down to the end of the second period when Tollgate scored again, tying the game. Frustrated moans came from George's side of the bleachers, and he too was shouting that the goal had been caused by an uncalled for foul. By the time the buzzer rang, even Casey's faced was screwed up in an expression that George had come to know all too well.

"And theeey're off for the third quarter, Venturi takes the puck—nice sweep check—passes to Morran, back to Venturi…"

George watched as Derek raced down the ice. Three Tollgate linemen were closing in from behind. _Come on…_ he whispered, standing on edge. The offensive players gained ground, trapping him and—

_Crash!_

The three linemen collided with Derek, slamming him into the wall. A gasp rose from the crowd.

"Oh my God! That is _definitely_ a penalty…"

The referee blew his whistle, and the other players circled around where Derek was lying on the ice, obscuring him from view. George sprinted down the aisle, his heart pounding.

"…Venturi's been boarded by _three_ players, this will absolutely be a major penalty, let's hope he's not out of the game…"

He threw open the door to the team box, where Derek had been lifted off the ice, and ran over to support his son. His helmet had been thrown off during the accident—a bad sign—and he was only semi-conscious, breathing ragged. The coach removed his padded top while teammates gathered round and an on-rink medical professional began examining him.

"What wrong?" George persisted.

"I don't know," the medic answered truthfully. "Maybe nothing, but he banged his head pretty hard so I can't say for sure. Look, he's coming round…"

Derek blinked rapidly, squinting open his eyes.

"You okay, man?" Sam asked in a worried voice.

"Peachy…" Derek murmured, coughing.

"That was a shitty move they pulled on you," one of his teammates contributed. Derek started coughing again, and then winced as if he had just experienced a jolt of pain. George glanced at the medic, concerned.

"He should get an MRI," the medic announced, ringing his stethoscope back around his neck.

Derek sat up.

"I'm fine," he stated weakly. "Just hit my head. I—" he broke into a fit of coughing. "—I can play the rest of the game."

"I don't think so," George countered. The last thing he needed was for there to be an unfound complication. He was worried enough as it was. "You're going straight to the hospital."

"It's the playoffs!" He cleared his throat, and said insistently, "I'm fine." He looked up at them all. "Really."

"Derek, you're in no condition to go back out there," the coach argued. "You should get that injury checked out." Derek stood up and started pulling his gear back on, disregarding him.

"Look, what do I have to do to convince you people that all I did was acquire a huge bruise? Stuff like this happens all the time, it's no big deal. An MRI can wait 20 minutes for us to kick their asses."

"Derek…" George began warningly.

"C'mon, let's take our penalty," Derek said, pulling on his helmet and heading out back onto the ice.

"Shit," George muttered.

* * *

"Thirty seconds left and Venturi's positioned to win the game… twenty… he lines up the shot—come on—goal! Just as the timer sounds! JS Thompson High wins and will be going to the championships!"

An enormous wave of applause erupted from the stands. George distractedly clapped with the rest, pushing through the departing crowd with the rest of the family trailing behind. He was relieved that the rest of the game had proceeded without further complications. He found Derek exiting the locker room, with teammates slapping him on the back and pounding fists with him.

"Party at Gregg's, D," one of them reminded him.

He was grinning, but his smile seemed strained. George saw him raise a hand to massage his temple. Sam was talking, but Derek didn't seem to be hearing him.

"Smerek!"

Marti ran up to Derek and threw her arms around his waist, hugging him fervently. The rest of the family surrounded him and began to offer their congratulations.

"—awesome!"

"—great goal there – Just as the timer went off!"

"—how's your head though?"

"Except for a splitting headache, fine," Derek answered.

"You're still getting an MRI," George stated. Casey nodded in agreement, opening her mouth, probably to lecture.

"We _won_, though," Derek said slowly, cutting her off. He closed his eyes, savoring the moment.

"I know, that was some goal at the end!" Sam exclaimed, clapping a hand to Derek's shoulder and shaking him lightheartedly. George smiled, forgetting the accident. They _had_ won, and Derek had saved the game… For a minute, everything was normal. Nora started trying to snap pictures of him with her camera while Derek laughed at her futile attempts. Lizzie was animatedly discussing the best plays of the game, and Edwin nodded, pretending he knew what she was talking about. Casey was joking with Sam about something.

"Smerek, you're bleeding," Marti said suddenly, pointing at the shoulder of his jersey. Derek raised a hand to his ear. When he pulled it away, his fingers were laced with deep crimson. Blood.

They all stared at him, horrified. Marti backed away, and Casey gasped. George felt his heart thumping wildly in his chest. Another bead of blood dripped onto Derek's shirt.

Derek blinked, and his eyes rolled up into his head, revealing bloodshot whites. His knees bucked and he collapsed.

For a minute they all stood there in shock.

"Someone call an ambulance!" George shouted, kneeling by his son. He felt Nora at his side. "_NOW!_"

* * *

A/N: *House theme music plays here* ...just kidding

Cliffhanger, though. I love dramatic storylines and wanted to write something...violent. Writing from George's point of view was exteremely difficult--I have no idea what he's thinking, but I tried. I'm going to write from everyone in the fam's point of view, so there might be a slight bit of dasey.

This'll probably end up as a two or three-shot... i'm working my way into chapter fics.

Thoughts? REVIEW! (I'll love you)

--JR


	2. Chapter 2

Wires, by JACmRob

**Chapter 2**

* * *

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

It had been two hours and twenty-seven minutes. Casey kept her eyes fixed on the clock, as if wishing it to expose some great revelation. Two hours and twenty-seven minutes since the ambulance had come screeching in and an unconscious Derek had been wheeled into the O.R. They still hadn't received word of his condition.

Casey anxiously tapped her hand against the arm of the synthetic waiting-room chair she was sitting in. On either side of her, the rest of the family was poised. They had barely said any words to each other in the two hours and twenty-seven—no—twenty eight minutes they'd been waiting. The quiet was suffocating. Tap, tap, tap. Her mother was holding George's hand. Edwin's eyes were darting about the room uneasily. Marti was curled up in her chair, Lizzie's arm around her. Tap, tap, tap.

A million thoughts raced through Casey's head. A million worse-case scenarios. What if he bled out? What if he was in a coma? What if he was brain-dead from head-trauma? Tap, tap, tap.

Or, what if they discovered some awful underlying cause—like a brain tumor? Or a blood clot? Or a genetic disease? Tap, tap, tap.

What if he had cancer and only a day to live? What if he died in surgery anyway? Damn my psyche, she thought. I've just given Derek an incurable disease.

And all this time he thought she hated him. He could die, and all he'd every think of her was that she was an aggressive bitch. What was the last thing she'd said to him? She scanned her mind, and her heart stopped cold.

"_Going to wish me luck, Space-Case?" He leaned against the doorway, arms crossed, the hint of a smirk playing at the corners of his mouth._

_Casey looked up from her book. Their eyes met, and her heart sped uncharacteristically. Stop it! She told herself crossly. Trying to ignore the red blooming in her cheeks she said,_

"_Why, do you need it?" Damn! _That_ was the best she could come up with? Why the _hell_ was she getting tongue-tied all of a sudden?_

"_Well _I_ don't," he replied smoothly, "but _you_ might. Remember last game, when you fell down the bleachers?"_

_Now she was definitely blushing._

"_Well hopefully you won't get too dizzy trying to remember your right from left," she retorted coolly, closing the door in his face._

'Hopefully you won't get too dizzy trying to remember your right from left?' Would those really be the last words she spoke to him? She hated herself. Why did she argue so much with him? Maybe so that he'd at least acknowledge her. But looking back, it didn't sound witty or playful. It just sounded mean.

Besides her, her mother was trying to distract herself by flipping through a magazine. Two-hours and thirty-three minutes. Tap, tap, tap.

Tick.

Tick.

Just when Casey thought she couldn't stand the screaming silence any longer, a doctor in blue scrubs and a surgical mask pushed through the door. George immediately leapt to his feet, with Mom right behind him. She stood. _Please be good news, please be good news_, she thought fervently.

She watched the medic speaking softly to George, and saw him nod grimly. The doctor placed a hand on his shoulder for a minute, before turning and exiting back through the OR doors. They swished ominously.

George turned to Casey, Edwin, Lizzie, and Marti. When he spoke, his voice was steady but she could hear the grief in it.

"They've managed to stem the hemorrhaging in his brain, but they still haven't found the cause of the bleed."

"Is Smerek going to be okay?" Marti asked in a small voice.

George opened his mouth to speak.

"The truth, Dad," Edwin said quietly.

"I don't know. It'll be a couple more hours before we know anything more."

They all nodded and returned to their chairs. Casey felt the knot in her chest tighten.

"Marti, Edwin, and Lizzie," Mom began in a gentle voice, "Maybe you should all go home. I'll drive you and we'll notify you immediately if anything changes, but—"  
"No."

It was Lizzie who spoke. Casey looked at her sister.

"Derek's our family," she said determinedly. "We aren't going anywhere."

Marti and Edwin nodded in assent.

George and her mom exchanged a look, and they abandoned the idea, sitting wearily in their chairs.

Two hours and thirty-nine minutes. Tap, tap, tap. The tension in the air was so thick Casey could have cut it with a knife. Or a scalpel. A shiver ran down her back. Tap, tap, tap.

Casey stood up.

"I'm going to get some fresh air," she announced. Her mother looked up.

"Don't go too far," she said. The look between them lingered for a moment and Casey finally walked out the ER doors.

It was dark, and the air had a biting chill. She zipped her coat tighter and, stuffing her hands in her pockets, began to walk down the sidewalk. In the distance a siren wailed. The sound drew nearer, until an ambulance pulled up at the unloading dock. The lights flashed sending lattice patterns across the pavement. Casey watched as a gurney was wheeled out and rushed into the building. Frenzied voices blurred with one another until the doors muted them. The ambulance pulled away. She continued walking. Her breath exhaled in small clouds of smoke, which curled and vanished in the brisk air.

Near the back of the building she stumbled upon a withered garden. In the middle of it was a faded statue of Mary, arms outstretched. She gazed up at her. Her porcelain features were shrouded in the darkness.

Casey had never been religious, but in the frost-bitten outdoor chapel of London State Hospital, she got down on her knees and prayed.

* * *

A/N: Cliffhanger! What do you think?

I'm going to do Marti's POV next.

Review!

--JR


	3. Chapter 3

Wires, by JACmRob

**Chapter Three**

* * *

Marti may have been young, but she wasn't stupid. The little girl swung her legs absently from the plush waiting room chair. Something _very_ bad was happening. She glanced at her dad—he had his head cradled in his hands. Lizzie was curled up on her chair like a cat. Marti couldn't tell if she was asleep. Casey still wasn't back from her walk—it had been over a half-hour. Edwin's eyes never wavered from the pair of double doors across the room.

Marti didn't understand just what was going on, but she knew it was serious. They'd taken Smerek—her Smerek—through those doors hours ago and he still hadn't come back. She looked at Nora, and the woman gave her an encouraging smile. Marti could tell it was fake. She wished, just once, the adults would tell her what was happening. All she wanted was to see Smerek.

Being in the hospital made her skin crawl. Just the antiseptic smell of it brought back early memories—when Mommy was here. When Mommy went in for a checkup and they found something. Daddy never told her anything then either. But she'd only been three. She remembered sitting in this room, on Smerek's lap. He'd been crying. They'd all been crying, and she didn't know why. Mommy never came back out of the hospital.

Daddy told her that Mommy had gone to be an angel with God. Marti never believed that. Her three-year-old rationality just couldn't make sense of it. Everyone was quiet for days, and strangers in dark clothing kept coming in and out of the house. Aunt Katie stayed with them for a while. The days turned to weeks, and the weeks to years, and eventually everyone stopped looking sad all the time. Marti knew Mommy was never coming back.

A man dressed in blue with a mask over his face entered through the doors. Her dad looked up expectantly, but the man instead walked over to a woman in the corner. The woman was crying. Why was everyone crying in hospitals? Marti hated it. What if Smerek never came back, like Mommy? She decided she would go find him.

Nobody noticed as Marti slid out of her chair and wandered down the hall way. There were so many doors, doors, doors, lining the walls. She wanted to peek into them to see if Smerek was in one of the rooms, but there were blinds across the windows. From around the corner came two doctors, carrying clipboards. Marti ducked into a stairwell and climbed up to the next floor. There weren't doors here but rows of beds. People in blue and green clothes flooded the large room, walking and talking, and machines beeped. Marti looked at the beds. They held people, but none were Smerek. The woman closest to her was deathly thin, with ragged grey skin and deep bags under her eyes. She had no hair. Beside her was a man with burnt, peeling, bloody skin. Marti felt sick. Suddenly, there was commotion.

"Coding!" someone shouted. Everyone flooded around one of the beds. The woman who'd been sitting beside it was pulled away by a nurse. She began screaming. Marti ran out of the room and back into the stairwell. The gaunt, skeletal face of the woman in the bed, and the burn-covered man still lingered in her mind. Where was Smerek? There were so many people here! Suddenly, her heart leapt. What if Mommy was in here, too? This was the last place Marti had seen her—what if she was still here after all these years? Marti climbed up another floor.

It was quieter there. There were beds, but most were empty. Nurses with clipboards talked softly at a u-shaped counter. A person was wheeling a long cart with a black bag on it. Marti watched it as it passed. Protruding from the back was a limp, colorless, but entirely human hand. Marti shrieked. The man stopped.

"Is something wrong?" he knelt down at her eye level. He was young, with a kind looking face and brown eyes.

"Do—" she hesitated. "Do you know where my mom is?"

"Well," he replied, "Where was the last place you saw her?"

"She came in here three years ago, and never came out."

The man looked at her sadly. "I don't think she's here anymore. I think she's up in heaven, now."

Marti stamped her foot. "That's what Daddy said, too! He never told me what it means, or why she can't come back! Can't someone just tell me why?"

The man took a deep breath. "Well, sometimes when people get very sick they come to the hospital. And the people who work here, like me, it's our job to get them better. But sometimes something bad happens and there's nothing we can do to save them."

"Like what?" she asked.

"Well, sometimes they've been in a bad accident," he told her, "or sometimes they're very sick with a disease. The systems inside their body that are necessary to keep them alive shut down. Sometimes it's their heart, or lungs, or liver. Their body can't function without them, and it stops working."

"Is that what it means to die?"

He hesitated, looking uncomfortable, and then said, "Yes."

"But what happens to them after they die?"

"Well, their bodies stop working but their souls go up to heaven, with God. So we're sad for a while, because we miss them, but not forever because we know that someday, when we die, we'll see them again."

Marti nodded. This made sense to her.

"Is there anyone else you're here with?" the man asked.

Marti nodded.

"Who?"

"My brother's in here somewhere." Marti said. "I don't want to go back until I find him."

"You're family's probably _really_ worried," the man said.

"I don't care!" Marti stated adamantly. "I want to see my brother!"

The doctor sighed. "What's your name?" he asked.

"Marti."

"I'm Doctor O'Malley. Okay Marti, I'll make a deal with you. If I show you your brother, then can I take you back to your family?"

Marti looked at the man cautiously. He held out his hand to her.

"Okay."

* * *

"Is that him?" she peered through the glass into the room beneath her. Dr. O'Malley was by her side.

"Yup, that's him."

Smerek was sitting upright, covered in a blue sheet. His eyes were closed and a tube trailed out of his mouth. A rigid metal brace held up his head. Behind him, three doctors with blue masks and caps were poking metal tools into the back of his head. Marti leaned forward and realized that his scalp had been cut completely open.

Instead of feeling revolted, Marti felt relieved. Smerek was here, and they were fixing him.

"What are they doing?" she asked.

"Right now, they're looking around in his brain, making sure everything's okay," Dr. O'Malley said.

She giggled. "They're in his _brain_?"

"You can see it right there." Dr. O'Malley pointed to a TV screen in the viewing room.

"_Ew_!" she squealed. "I can't wait to tell Smerek I saw his _brain_!"

The doctor smiled.

"Now let's get you back to your family, like you promised."

Dr. O'Malley pressed a button on the wall and asked the people below a question. A voice from an intercom filled the small room, saying something Marti didn't understand. The smile fell from Dr. O'Malley's face.

"We need to get back to your folks," he told her. "_Now_."

* * *

A/N: Sorry it took me forever to update! I'm hopeless when it comes to finding time. Anyway, I did my best to write from Marti's point of view, and I hope I did it justice.

I couldn't help throwing in a Grey's Anatomy crossover. This just seemed so much like one of George's lame storylines.

So… Review! What do you think the surgeons told George? I haven't decided whether I'm going to kill off Derek yet (Of course, I won't tell you when I do), but give me your input. Would you be able to handle it if I did? I'm not sure _I'll_ be able to handle it.

Give me your opinions and I'll try and update as _soon_ as I can, I promise. (But don't hold me on it!) And for any of you who read it, I'm going to update my Scrubs fic _very_ soon. I know you all must hate me for taking forever. I sincerely apologize.

Cheers!  
--JR


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